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Chris Hughes

Co-Chair, Economic Security Project

Chris Hughes has spent his career working at the intersection of politics and technology. He was a co- founder of Facebook, a digital architect for President Obama’s campaign, and the publisher of the digital and print magazine The New Republic. In 2016, he co-founded the Economic Security Project, a project to explore how to provide financial security for all Americans through cash transfers. Through its conferences, events, and investment fund, the Project seeks to understand how a basic income might work in the United States and what a political route forward might look like. Hughes also works on a range of progressive causes from his home in New York City. He is an investor and board member in several New York- and California-based start-ups, and he graduated from Harvard in 2006 magna cum laude with a degree in History and Literature.

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Chris Hughes considers himself lucky—too lucky. Chris was born into a modest family in North Carolina before getting a scholarship to Harvard University, where he was the freshman roommate to a guy named Mark Zuckerberg. That led to him becoming one of the co-founders of Facebook, core to the startup in the early days, including being the spokesperson for the company. That alone made him a very lucky man, and a very, very wealthy one—too wealthy.